After being recruited into the children’s ministry internship program I brought my fun-loving personality along. I remember trying to motivate children to bring pennies for a mission project at my first VBS at the church.
To ratchet up the motivation and fun factor, I challenged the children to bring $1,000 in pennies over five days. If they did so, I would swallow a live goldfish. Sure enough, they eclipsed the goal with everyone participating.
On Friday afternoon, I took the life goldfish by the tail, and while it was flapping, I swallowed it, the tail wiggling as it went down! The children were cheering, and it was near bedlam!
To this day, I run into forty-five-year-old adults who remember the great goldfish swallow! It did not really have much to do with the Bible teaching, i.e... it was not some inverted Jonah experience but it sure was fun and memorable.
The kids loved it! They loved VBS, they loved the leaders, they loved the church and they wanted to be there every Sunday and whatever events we did in-between.
We did teach the Bible in serious and life impacting ways but there was always a current of fun and relational joy running through the ministry. This is the essence of the fun participatory model.
In the late 1970s, this approach became popular in reaction to the Information Model. The Participation “Fun” Model created a fun environment that provided children with opportunities to participate in activities that drove home the point of the day’s lesson.
The concern then was that children were growing up and leaving the church because of an overly rigorous educational approach to learning.
To capture the hearts of children, leaders thought, the church needed to engage them and make Christianity and Christian growth fun. I have identified several key elements in this children’s ministry approach.
The Fun Participatory Model of Children's Ministry
Bible Teaching Real Life Connection – The Participation “Fun” Model views Scripture as foundational to effective children’s ministry. However, since they see the Word of God as the handbook for living life, this model teaches God’s Word with a strong emphasis on connecting the Word to real life. In this model, children’s real life is a focal point. This leads to a more topical approach to teaching with a life application orientation. The felt needs of children are often the starting point in this regard.
Active Learning – Activities are a hallmark of the Participatory “Fun” Model. Children are engaged through games, learning centers, artwork and singing. There is a keen sense of learning through action and participation. In this model, every effort is made to engage the children through action, so this model tends to resonate with the kinesthetic learner.
Specialized Volunteerism – The development of this model led to a specialization of roles in the teaching process. “Volunteers” are slotted into ministry according to their giftedness. Those gifted at “presenting” are the leaders that communicate the Bible truth. Those gifted musically, lead worship. Others lead a small group. One version of this model emphasizes a large-group/small-group approach: a gifted speaker presents a Bible Truth to a large group of children of various ages, and then small-group leaders shepherd a group of same-aged children in discussing and applying the truth that has been presented. This Participation “Fun” approach bears many similarities to a youth ministry model. In some cases, the “speaker” is replaced by a multimedia presentation of the Bible teaching.
Fun/Engagement – The Participatory “Fun” Model emerged in some sense from the sense that church had become boring and a drudgery for children. The initial leaders felt the need to break from a more traditional “schooling” approach and sensed that church should be fun and a place where children wanted to come. There was certainly some truth in this assessment. Therefore, in this model fun for children is bedrock. I have heard it expressed that “if the teaching is lacking, but the children have fun, they will return, and then we can improve the teaching.” Fun is key!
Seeker Sensitive Evangelism – While most children’s ministry models are evangelistic in nature, the Participatory “Fun” Model frequently has a seeker sensitive bent. They are concerned about children raised in unchurched homes, from non-Christian families who would never naturally find their way into a church. Therefore, they often create special initiatives, reaching out to the non-Christian child. These are often pre-evangelistic in the sense that they appeal to the fun-loving nature of children and may not have an explicit Christian message, hoping to attract boys and girls to the church community where they will hear the message of the gospel.
The Strengths and Weaknesses Of The Fun Participatory Model
Not surprisingly, this model was closely associated with the megachurch movement and its concern for the “seeker.”
Advocates of the Participatory “Fun” model believe that many non-Christian children are unlikely to engage with a ministry that was too “heavy with Bible content.”
As the megachurch movement advanced, so did the Participatory “Fun” model of children’s ministry. Very large churches sponsored conferences where they enthusiastically introduced this model to hundreds of other churches. Curriculum was developed by large churches and sold across the US.
Churches adopted themes for their Children’s Ministry such as “Kidzone,” of “The Reef,” and installed elaborate stages with background scenery and colorful murals. Some churches even put in rock-climbing walls, zip lines, video games, pin ball machines, and elaborate playground equipment.
With thousands of children attending on the weekends, other churches were enamored by the “success” of Willow Creek, Saddleback, etc. and wanted follow suit, hoping to achieve the same growth.
With American culture focusing on “bigger the better,” and success as size, this model has probably become the most common children’s ministry approach in the United States.
While the vast majority of churches do not have the financial resources for zip lines, etc.. they follow the model as they can.
This active learning with its emphasis on the life application of God’s truth is one of this model’s strengths. This model also values the evangelical commitment to teach the Word of God even as it placed a significant emphasis on application and response.
In addition to encouraging a life response to a Bible Truth, leaders focused on the child’s attitude toward church. Adults who choose this model are highly motivated by their desire that children want to return to church, find meaningful relationships in church, and experience Christian joy.
As an alternative to the Information Model, the Participatory “Fun” approach can have some unintended results.
- The careful teaching of God’s Word can become assumed rather than guarded. Gradually, the teaching may not be as strong and accurate as leaders intend. Beginning at the felt needs of a child can lead to diminished focus on God’s Truth. This can lead to errant Bible teaching. The desire to connect with the children and make church enjoyable can crowd out and even overshadow high-quality Bible teaching.
- In the large-group/small-group approach, the large-group teaching across a wide age range can be ineffective, particularly for younger children. I have been in churches where the children’s ministry was like a youth group meeting for preschoolers. Oops.
- Although unintended, the “specialized volunteerism” approach can actually be rooted in a lack of commitment from children’s ministry leaders, frequently stemming from the Mega Church dependence on staff led ministries. To say it plainly, many churches just don’t have enough committed children’s ministry leaders, so they find creative ways to do ministry with who they have. In some cases instead of discipling children, leaders are used for “crowd control.” Building meaningful relationships can be lost.
- Although unintended, I have observed many churches where the small-group leaders are ill-equipped and are not able to help children understand and apply the teaching.
- Finally, there is a bent to have activities that are completely unrelated to the Bible teaching simply for the sake of fun (goldfish swallowing 😊). Now, I’m not against fun. In fact, I believe fun is key to children’s ministry, but we can’t let it become the ministry’s goal. Several years ago, at a children’s ministry seminar, a children’s pastor at an exceptionally large church was asked what success looked like on Sunday morning. She answered, “Fun.” This may fall short of the Great Commission calling that the church received from Jesus Christ.
It seems evident that the Participatory Model does not directly flow from exposition of biblical material. I would suggest that instead, the Participatory Model is rooted in the secular educational world’s reaction to the traditional educational model.
Elements of the model are supported by “proof texts” from the Bible. It is an example of “the cart before the horse,” so to speak. In other words, Bible passages are pulled out (often out of context) to show that the elements of the Participatory “Fun” Model are “biblical.”
The weakness of this approach is in the tendency to misinterpret a Bible passage to support one of the elements in your ministry philosophy all the while ignoring direct biblical imperatives regarding children’s ministry.
A New Fun Participatory Model
In contrast, we have shown that God offers a completely biblical model for ministry in Deuteronomy 6:4-9 with several key elements that work together to lead to transformation in the life of children (and adults).
These elements are evident in the Apostle Paul’s work as well as in the ministry of Jesus Himself. We have also shown that God used these same qualities in His teaching of Moses (Exodus 3-4).
Transformational Children’s Ministry should flow directly from the Bible, not from educational models developed by people and then supported with biblical “proof texts.”
Therefore, it seems appropriate to analyze the Informational Model through the lens of the five principles found in Deuteronomy 6:4-9, Relationship, Experience, Truth, Discussion and Response.
Element | Fun Participatory Model | Comment |
|---|---|---|
Relationship | **** | Relationships are important and the activities tend to be relationship builders. |
Experience | *** | “Experiences” abound but not intentionally connected to the Bible teaching. |
Truth | *** | An essential element but often diminished by felt need approach and need for “fun.” |
Discussion | ** | Real life discussion dependent on “equipped” small group leaders. |
Response | ** | “Talking” about application is an essential element. Actual response is something different. |
The strength of this model is on relationships and active learning. Engaging children through active learning is essential and the strength of this model. The following four additions could enrich the Participatory Fun Model:
- Experiential Bible Teaching – engaging the senses of the children as in Deuteronomy 6:4-9 or in Jesus’ ministry (cf. Luke 5:4-11). Using activities to engage the children experientially with the Bible truth.
- Truth – Beginning with God’s Word and teaching in age-appropriate ways all the while continuing to maintain the “felt need” sensitivity.
- Discussion – Investing more in equipped leaders who can create an environment where children can “talk about” the Bible truth and the challenges of real life.
- Response – Giving children the opportunity to respond to the truth of God’s Word in the teaching setting and afterwards in their daily life.
The Participatory Model is a force to be reckoned with as it has proved to be an approach used by God to impact thousands of children. God has brought the fruit of changed lives and effective children’s ministry through this innovative and fresh approach.
The addition of these four elements to this vibrant ministry model would significantly add to this already fruitful ministry approach.
Next week we will examine the Contemplative Reflective Model!